Crossroads:
mileposts

Doctor gave selflessly of her talents worldwide

Konnie Landis (C 90)
was a doctor who took
her skills and
compassion around the
world. She was a
newlywed who made
her home in Everett,
Wash. She was a faithful Mennonite, a
marimba player, a potter and a poet.

“She had this drive to make the
world a better place. She did it with
the lives she touched and the lives she
saved,” said Leslie Yingling-Breeden, a
friend and member of Titambe
Marimba, a Whidbey Island music
group that included Landis, 36, as its
youngest member.

Landis died at her home June 20,
a day after her first wedding
anniversary. Late last year, she was
diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

She is survived by her husband,
Bill Sutherland, an aeronautical
engineer at Boeing; parents Dr.
Laverne and Jean Landis of
Tunkhannock, Pa.; sisters Kathleen
Landis and Karen Alderfer; and
brother Ken Landis. Another brother,
Kenton, preceded her in death.

A family practice doctor, she
graduated in 1996 from Temple
University Medical School in
Philadelphia. Landis served her
residency in Yakima, Wash., and then
came to Everett’s Community Health
Center in connection with the
National Health Service Corp.

Always, her focus was on people
who where medically underserved.
And always, before and after meeting
Sutherland in 2000, there was the lure
of the world.

After their wedding on June 19,
2004, they embarked on a honeymoon
of service and adventure. In New
Orleans, they built a Habitat for
Humanity house.

“We had a blender, we had a
toaster, so for wedding gifts we asked
for donations for a trip to Africa,”
Sutherland said. With $2,000 to spend
on programs to fight AIDS and help
schools, they went to Uganda for
several months.

“She was very caring,” said Jean
Landis, Konnie’s mother. “Who on
their honeymoon goes to Uganda and
to work for Habitat for Humanity?
Who does that?”

After graduating from EMU,
Landis spent the early 1990s in San
Francisco with Mennonite Volunteer
Service. Working with AIDS patients, “she watched a lot of people die,”
Sutherland said.

Landis took a year between San
Francisco and starting medical school
to travel the world alone. She worked
with Mother Teresa’s order in India
and at an orphanage in Eastern
Europe.

Her mother saw an artistic side—
as a potter, photographer, poet and
musician. “She gave everyone in her
wedding a piece of pottery she made,”
Jean Landis said.

Dr. Carolyn Shermer worked with
Landis at Community Health Center
in Everett. “I think she had only two
or three weeks’ vacation. She took two
weeks to go to Vietnam to deliver food
and medical supplies. She was very
selfless.

“She loved life so much. Now that
she’s gone, beautiful days make me
think of her,” Shermer said.

Sutherland has a poignant
memory of their first anniversary.
Although his wife was close to death,
they drove to Mukilteo.

“She knew she was dying. We
didn’t talk about it. She was strong in
her faith,” he said. “We were only
married a year. What’s important is the
example she lived out, of cheerful
service. I never in my life met
someone like Konnie.

“Her gift was herself. I’ve seen
parts of the world I never would have
seen. I was being changed by her,”
Sutherland said.

—Julie Muhlstein
The Herald, Everett, Wash.

Editor’s note: Konnie had been nominated
for the annual distinguished service
award. She is one of the youngest
individuals to have ever received such
consideration since the inception of the
award in 1984. We honor her life given in
service to others.